Rep. Mike Turner, the House Democratic Caucus Chairman, and Rep. John Litz of Morristown sat down with reporters to give a new timeline, one that leaves Odom almost completely out of the picture. In this version, Litz begins asking around about a Republican candidate who could play the foil to Rep. Jason Mumpower. By the second week of December, Williams comes to Litz to see if the Democrats can deliver, but Litz only tells “Speaker Naifeh and one other individual that day,” according to a timeline he released.

(UPDATE: Odom tells me this evening that he “never claimed to be the architect of the Williams for Speaker thing; I nominated him because he wanted me to.” Odom said he did not know Turner and Litz were meeting with reporters, and said of the Flyer story, “I don’t understand why this is a major issue.”)

Odom, who says Naifeh was out of the loop, is mentioned once in Litz’s timeline: The two speak during a caucus meeting, during which Odom “informed me that he had spoken to Rep. Williams and mentioned the Speakership to him around Thanksgiving.” Litz says at that point he and Naifeh decided to keep the Williams Plan quiet until the day of the vote.

Turner said in today’s interview that Litz’s timeline was not meant to contradict Odom, but it’s obvious that House Democrats are quickly coming to the defense of Naifeh, and at the expense of Odom. Odom, who narrowly was re-elected House Democratic Leader by his colleagues after the Nov. elections, has been skating on thin ice ever since his comments to the Memphis Flyer that said Naifeh was the reason Democrats lost the majority in the first place.

When asked if Odom was in jeopardy of losing his House leadership position, Turner replied: “I think there are some concerns with some of our members of the caucus, and I think he’s got to address those with some members.”

An interesting note: Turner said if House Republicans had selected Nashville Republican Rep. Beth Harwell — and not Mumpower — as their Speaker candidate of choice, the plan to elect Williams likely never would have happened.